KCAC

[Men's Golf] Golf Finishes 6th at KCAC Championships

The Falcon golf team traveled to Buffalo Dunes Golf Course in Garden City, Kan., on Monday and Tuesday to compete in the KCAC Championship tournament, coming home with a 6th place finish.Round 1 was the best for Friends, standing in 6th place with a team score of 327, but just 6 strokes out of 3rd. Kresten Trebbe (Fr., Augusta, Kan.) shot an opening round 78 to tie for 8th. Skyler Miner (Jr., Chanute, Kan.) was right behind him with a 79 and Bradlee Perry (Fr., Clearwater, Kan.) shot an 81.The Falcons shot a similar 328 on day two, but fell back from the pack, then 20 strokes behind 3rd place. None of the Friends golfers were able to break 80 on the day.A final round 348 prevented the Falcons from moving up, as they finished 6th of the 7 teams competing in Garden City.Perry finished tied for 19th and Miner joined him in the top 30 in a tie for 28th.Coach Aaron Winter's comments:"As has been the case most of the season, our inexperience and inconsistency came back to get us a little bit, but overall we didn't do too bad.  It seems like it's always pretty windy out at Buffalo Dunes, but it didn't help that when we played our practice round on Sunday the wind was pretty strong out of the south and the greens were really slow, then on Monday the wind turned around to the north and the greens were quicker, like we expected, but still not as fast as we thought they would be, so that kind of messed with the guys a bit.  Then, on Tuesday the wind turned back around to the south and was in the neighborhood of 30-40 mph most of the day, so it really raised the scores for the day." Rounds 1 & 2"Even though we didn't play great in the first round we still managed a 327 because Kesten (78), Skyler (79) and Bradlee (81) played pretty good.  We were in sixth place, but only six shots out of third place, so we really weren't in too bad a position.  The second round is always a little tougher because it's the last 18 holes of a 36-hole day, which is a real grind both physically and mentally.  We weren't quite as good, but Bradlee played good again with an 80, and Andrew shot an 82 so he improved quite a bit, and Kesten shot an 82 for another solid round, so we ended up posting a 328.  We did lose a little ground to the teams ahead of us, but still were only 10 shots out of fourth place and 7 shots out of fifth place, so we were still within striking distance." Round 3 (Final Round)"In general, I like for my players to think their way around the course rather than trying to overpower it all the time.  My philosophy is to play aggressive but smart and not take any unnecessary risks.  However, going into the final round we were still in position to catch KWU and possibly even Sterling and move into 4th place for the tournament.  We really didn't have anything to lose and everything to gain because no matter where we finished in the tournament the worst we could do was finish 6th in the overall season standings, and if we beat KWU in this tournament we'd actually pass them for the season and move into 5th overall.  So, I decided to tell the guys to be aggressive and stay in attack mode all day long. "I'd seen us come up short on too many putts the first day so I wanted the guys to putt to make them instead of trying not to miss by too much.  The problem with this was the conditions – when you're playing in 30-40 mph winds with even stronger gusts, it's difficult to be too aggressive because you can really cost yourself some strokes by trying to do a little too much. "All in all I was pleased with how the guys played on Tuesday.  Our score certainly doesn't show it, but the guys really did go after it all day.  Bradlee continued his good play with an 81, which considering the conditions was a much better score than you'd think.  Skyler's score (86) doesn't necessarily show it, but he hit the ball great all tournament long he just got a couple bad breaks Tuesday. I know he was more aggressive on his putting which probably cost him a couple more shots, but that's what I asked him to do so I was proud of him for that.  Andrew played better overall on Tuesday than he did on Monday but had a rough finish to his round that cost him a few shots to finish with an 86.  Kesten got a really bad break off the tee on his first hole that cost him some shots, so he found himself fighting to recover all day long which was really difficult with the wind, but he hung in there as best he could.  Danny never really got anything going but did a good job keeping the round from getting out of hand. "We didn't make up the ground we needed to but maintained our position and the guys did exactly what I asked of them.  Sure, we would have liked to have better results, but they gave me everything they had and at the end of the day that's all I can ask!" Final Team Scores:1. Bethany: 303-295-319=9172. Southwestern: 309-300-318=9273. Ottawa: 322-313-308=9434. Sterling: 321-324-324=9725. Kansas Wesleyan: 324-323-339=9866. Friends: 327-328-348=10037. Bethel: 339-329-349=1017Friends Invidividual Scores:T19. Bradlee Perry: 81-80-81=242T29. Skyler Miner: 79-85-86=25031. Kesten Trebbe: 78-81-95=25433. Andrew Briggs: 89-82-86=25739. Danny Crippen: 94-87-97=278